Machines such as dozers, motor graders, wheel loaders, etc., are used to perform a variety of tasks. For example, these machines may be used to move material at a work site. The machines may operate in an autonomous or semi-autonomous manner to perform these tasks in response to commands generated as part of a work plan for the machines. The machines may receive instructions in accordance with the work plan to perform operations including digging, loosening, carrying, etc., different materials at the work site such as those related to mining, earthmoving and other industrial activities.
Autonomously operated machines may remain consistently productive without regard to a human operator or environmental conditions. In addition, autonomous systems may permit operation in environments that are unsuitable or undesirable for a human operator. Autonomous or semi-autonomous systems may also compensate for inexperienced human operators as well as inefficiencies associated with repetitive tasks.
In some operations such as mining, it is desirable to move material from one location to another, such as to expose a layer of material to be mined. When these material moving operations are performed by machines such as dozers, the material is moved as a plurality of layers with each layer being stack or laid upon the previously formed layer. The layer creation process may be inefficient and uneven layers may result in efficient and unsteady movement over the previously formed layers.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,108,949 discloses a planning system for an earthmoving operation that uses three levels of processing. The planning system uses the geometry of the work site to determine an optimum excavation operation for a particular machine. The optimum excavation operation may be determined based upon a performance criteria, such as a volume of material excavated, energy expended, and time.
The foregoing background discussion is intended solely to aid the reader. It is not intended to limit the innovations described herein, nor to limit or expand the prior art discussed. Thus, the foregoing discussion should not be taken to indicate that any particular element of a prior system is unsuitable for use with the innovations described herein, nor is it intended to indicate that any element is essential in implementing the innovations described herein. The implementations and application of the innovations described herein are defined by the appended claims.